[net.sf-lovers] Cobalt-60

@RUTGERS.ARPA:GOOD@ACC (04/27/85)

From: Greg Goodknight <GOOD@ACC>

Thanx and a hat tip to Mark Purtill and Chuq Von Rospach for fleshing
out the Bode-Bakshi connection. My entire flame was based on the
similarity of the two characters being too much for just chance. It is
comforting to know I'll have co-defendants if Bakshi "is that stupid".

I dug through some old boxes at home last night, looking for any
remnants of my old comic books. Eureka! Amongst the Zap, Freak
Brothers, Mr.Natural and Slow Death comics were the following treasures:
	1) Junkwaffel #1,2 and 4
	2) The Man
	3) The Collected Cheech Wizard
All marked "copyright 197X by Vaughn Bode. All rights reserved", and "For
Adults Only" (good reasons for it, too).  Published by The Print Mint, 
Berzerkly, California.

Cobalt-60 makes his debut in Junkwaffel #2 (copyright 1972). When did
Bakshi start on "WIZARDS" ? I think I saw it on a first run in 1976.

From chuqui@topaz:
>Mark (being assisted by Larry Todd, I believe) is doing a good job,
>but he isn't his father, and it shows. Vaughn didn't get very far on
>Cobalt-60 while he was alive because he found it just too depressing.
>Reading Mark's work, based on what his father did do, notes, and his
>own ideas, shows why. 

Junkwaffel #1, by the way, "is dedicated to Larry Todd and my son, Mark",
and the watercolor on the back cover is signed "TODD/BODE". Also of 
interest in that issue is a robot war machine carrying a nameplate 
saying "PEACE" (another NECRON-90 'similarity'). I'll have to
hunt up the EPIC series to compare the old and new Cobalts, but here is
a passage from Junkwaffel #4 (copyright 1972):

	"The woman was crying, a priest was saying comforting words....
Cobalt wasn't listening. 'She's a seed!' his mind screamed, 'a fertile
woman, maybe the last human capable of carrying a child!' ... His knees
trembled, 'A seed' .....Cobalt's mind reels, his hands shake like an
old man's 'A seed!'. He felt destruction, facinated, hung between escape
and hatred that bordered insane pleasure. 'I must kill that woman' he 
screams in silence, 'Do it, do it, DO IT!' "

The rest of it is VERY depressing. While the first Cobalts were the normal
frame-by-frame strip, the story above was almost all text bordering a few
charcoal and pencil drawings. Easier to write than to draw that kind 
of action.


			Greg Goodknight <good@ACC.ARPA>
			just Another Computer Company in
			Santa Barbara
------

brust@hyper.UUCP (Steven Brust) (04/29/85)

> All marked "copyright 197X by Vaughn Bode. All rights reserved", and "For
> Adults Only" (good reasons for it, too).  Published by The Print Mint, 
> Berzerkly, California.
> 
> 			Greg Goodknight <good@ACC.ARPA>
> 			just Another Computer Company in
> 			Santa Barbara
> ------

Speaking of underground comics, is anyone
here familiar with Reed Waller's "Omaha"?
Great stuff!
		-- SKZB